Second Amendment Update: Important New Cases on Ammunition, Machine Guns and Assault Weapons Keep Fine-Tuning Gun Rights Laws

By Robert Phillips Deputy District Attorney (ret.) 

Second Amendment, the right to keep and bear arms, cases are coming down fast and furious. So, I’m combining a number of them here to save you time and effort: 

Ammunition 

First, note that the decision in Rhode v. Bonta (9th Cir. July 24, 2025) 145 F.4th 1090, dealing with the issue of the constitutionality of California’s attempt to regulate the sale of ammunition (See California Legal Update, Vol 30, #12; Oct. 30, 2025), has been vacated so that an en banc, 11-justice panel can reconsider the issue.  

In the three-judge decision, the court affirmed the district court’s grant of a permanent injunction, prohibiting the enforcement of California’s ammunition background check regime, finding that it facially violates the Second Amendment. (See Cal. Penal Code §§ 30312, 30352 and 30370.) If I should be so bold, I would predict that the en banc panel will reach the same conclusion. 

Machine Guns 

United States v. Kittson (9th Cir. Dec. 10, 2025) F.4th (2025)  161 F.4th 619:  More than a decade ago, the Ninth Circuit held that machine guns are “dangerous and unusual weapons,” and as such, are not protected by the Second Amendment. (United States v. Henry (9th Cir. 2012) 688 F.3rd 637.) In this new case, the defendant, a convicted felon, acted as the go-between in the sale of a World War II-era Russian machine gun. Unbeknownst to the defendant, Daniel Kittson, the proposed purchaser was an undercover federal agent posing as a firearms and drug trafficker.  

Charged in federal court with possessing and transferring a machine gun in violation of 18 U.S.C.S. § 922(o), Kittson was convicted. On appeal, Kittson first argued that a statutory exemption (found in subd. (2)(A) of section 922(o)) — exempting “transfers to or by, or possession by or under the authority of, the United States, or any department or agency thereof or a State, or a department, agency, or ....

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